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Re: Flacco Deal Update...

No way Flacco has earned a Rivers/Eli/BenR type of contract. That said, you won't get him to agree to a deal anywhere near a Kolb or Cassel deal, even if they were egregiously overpaid. Plus QB is the one position where a failure to get an average or slightly above-average player at minimum, guarantees failure (barring a time-machine and an all-time great defense). So you hope to sign him in between these two levels, but would be forced to sign him at the higher level if push came to shove.

From that point, if Flacco keeps improving, you signed a fair to eventually-cheap deal; if Flacco fails to develop and plateaus at around where he is, you overpaid at the position fairly significantly.

If Flacco insists on a deal that is bigger than Rivers/Eli/Ben then I think you make him wait until 2013 and take your chances.

Re: Flacco Deal Update...

Originally Posted by Haloti92

No way Flacco has earned a Rivers/Eli/BenR type of contract. That said, you won't get him to agree to a deal anywhere near a Kolb or Cassel deal, even if they were egregiously overpaid. Plus QB is the one position where a failure to get an average or slightly above-average player at minimum, guarantees failure (barring a time-machine and an all-time great defense). So you hope to sign him in between these two levels, but would be forced to sign him at the higher level if push came to shove.

From that point, if Flacco keeps improving, you signed a fair to eventually-cheap deal; if Flacco fails to develop and plateaus at around where he is, you overpaid at the position fairly significantly.

If Flacco insists on a deal that is bigger than Rivers/Eli/Ben then I think you make him wait until 2013 and take your chances.

Re: Flacco Deal Update...

Noway hes worth rivers money? I realize eli and ben won SBs but at the same point in their respective careers theyre all arguably similar players even statistically. Wanting more isnt necessarily below market price with inflation and considering his age. I believe, may be wrong, but eli has the latest deal and it was signed in 2008? If he was asking to be paid brady or brees money id agree youre better off waiting him out but those deals those guys signed were young qbs you believe will take the next step and can lead your team which i believe he falls under.

Re: Flacco Deal Update...

Originally Posted by The Excellector

I can understand where RedMike is coming from. What's going here, in my opinion, is that the defense has long been establishing, while the offense is trying to establish itself. So, the coaching staff and front office have chosen the strategy of leaning on the established side of the ball, while they methodically develop the offense. It's not easy to develop any particular side of the ball. It took the Ravens four years to develop the defense into the type of unit that set the foundation for its current reputation.

I agree. But if you think back to how they developed the defense, they drafted Lewis, Boulware, Sharper, McCallister and Starks. Then they added key veteran free agents. Quality players who still had siomething left in the tank and were itching for a ring (or at least some semblance of success). They haven't quite done that on the offensive side of the ball. They have a solid nucleus, but the ballsy free agent acquisitions have not taken place yet, IMO.

Re: Flacco Deal Update...

Originally Posted by Haloti92

No way Flacco has earned a Rivers/Eli/BenR type of contract. That said, you won't get him to agree to a deal anywhere near a Kolb or Cassel deal, even if they were egregiously overpaid. Plus QB is the one position where a failure to get an average or slightly above-average player at minimum, guarantees failure (barring a time-machine and an all-time great defense). So you hope to sign him in between these two levels, but would be forced to sign him at the higher level if push came to shove.

From that point, if Flacco keeps improving, you signed a fair to eventually-cheap deal; if Flacco fails to develop and plateaus at around where he is, you overpaid at the position fairly significantly.

If Flacco insists on a deal that is bigger than Rivers/Eli/Ben then I think you make him wait until 2013 and take your chances.

Really they're all around the same all 100+M contracts which meanbs jacksquat, GUARNTEE'D money is where it at:
Rivers 6 years 39Guarntee
Ben 8 years 36 G
Vick 6 years 37 G
Eli 7 35G
Peyton is under the 100M club but his guarntee'd money is about the ame with 5 years 35G.

Personally I think Flacco is in the land of 7 years 100M(with all the incentives) and about 32G. Incentive laden more than the others, considering he hasn't had the level of success(even at this point in his career) as the others besides Rivers. But personally I don't think Rivers is very elite either. Give Joe a pair of 6'6' and fast damn receivers(who can also catch), along with Gates and a decent running game and I bet he puts up far better stats. They've handed Joe a washedup short Mason, a possesion guy in Boldin, a beatup end of career Heap(thanks to Boller) and scrubs elsewhere, until T.Smith. And a unimaginative bum of a OC who shouldn't even be coaching HS ball let alone the NFL.

Re: Flacco Deal Update...

Originally Posted by ballhawk

Flacco had a great season last year...what the hell are you guys talking about? And he did it with a cast of rookie and 2nd year receivers (who probably led the league in dropped passes). He is going to get $100 million...and he is worth it.

I dont know what you watched, but Flacco had a pretty shitty season last year, even to his standards which already arent very high.

Flacco has always had the benefit of a ridiculously good defense to bail him out.

Re: Flacco Deal Update...

I dont know what you watched, but Flacco had a pretty shitty season last year, even to his standards which already arent very high.

Flacco has always had the benefit of a ridiculously good defense to bail him out.

And that absolutely should reflect in his contract.

He didn't have a great year, but he did look good in the playoffs. As far as his off-year is concerned, its hard to tell how much of that is attributed to his terrible offensive coordinator. When the line isn't blocking and everyone is running 9 routes, its hard to be consistent.

Re: Flacco Deal Update...

Originally Posted by bmorecareful

Are you seriously willing to put so much faith in QB rating that you'll decide whether to re-sign Flacco based on 10 points of variance from year to year? I'm sorry, but for as logical and intelligent as you sound, the core of your argument is very dubious.

Prognosticate over 10 points worth of QB rating as much as you want, but here's a simpler explanation: 1) a given player's performance doesn't exist in a vacuum, 2) because of that fact, a certain degree of variance one way or the other is COMPLETELY unavoidable, 3) you can't be sure that variance is due entirely or mostly to the player himself.

Case in point: as I said earlier, 5 (or possibly 6, depending on how you want to define it) of Ray Rice's rushing TDs in 2011 came as a result of a long pass play downed within the 10 yard line or a DPI in the end zone. If those 5 TDs are passing TDs, Flacco's QB rating goes up almost 5 points.

Does that "really" mean he was 5 points better? I think we can all agree that is not necessarily the case.

You can play with the numbers however you want, but to pin all your hopes on QB rating is, in a word, hopeless. I don't care what Flacco's QB rating is in 2012 if he's helping his team win, particularly when the chips are down and no one else seems to be stepping up. He did exactly that often enough to convince me last year.

And I'm not an anti-stats guy. I'm actually pretty big on stats in a lot of respects. But you'll never see a Cam Cameron passer post gaudy stats under ANY circumstances. Drew Brees has been the most consistently excellent passer of the last 5 years, and even he only broke a 90 QB rating once under Cam, in 2004. His average QB rating in San Diego was an 84.9, slightly lower than Joe's career average, and he was a worse passer on the whole in San Diego. Do you think that's a coincidence? I don't, and I think it further illustrates why pinning all your hopes on 1 stat is a mistake.

First, QB rating isn't '1 stat,' it's four stats rolled into one number, intended to be a measure of overall efficiency of a QB's play. You can debate its validity if you like, but it exists and is constantly referenced because it is one of the better indicators of how well a team is doing offensively. Not just the QB, I grant you--it also says something for how well the receivers are getting the ball, how far they're making it when they catch a pass, etc. About the only thing it measures that is mostly on the QB is interceptions.

Second, it's like this. Here's two sets of data for you--first, the ratings for all the QBs of the teams that won 12 or more games last year, and then the records of the teams that had QBs which finished the year +/- 5 points of Flacco on the QB rating scale, and who played all 16 games (if you want, throw out Jackson--he only played 15). I posted this earlier, but not in this format, so maybe it'll be clearer this way:

So what does it tell you? Obviously, it's not a large enough sample size to say anything definitively, but it does show two things--that Flacco's QB rating was by far the worst of the teams that were the 'elite' of the league last year, and that QBs who got ratings similar to Flacco tended to win far fewer games.

So... upon seeing this, it raises a few questions for me, and makes one thing seem likely. The latter first--getting high quality (statistically) play out of whoever is at the QB position is less important to the Ravens than it is to other teams (or, at least it was to the 2011 Ravens--maybe 2012 will be different). If you get 12 wins with an 80.9 rating, you're apparently making up for that deficiency in other areas (defense, running... probably not special teams!). The questions it raises are these--how many wins would that have been at a 90 rating? How many at a 70 rating? If that's the spread you're working with, what's that actually worth paying for?

Is this in any way definitive? Am I saying I'm right? Not at all. But I think it's a logical, cogent viewpoint, and I think that I want to see another year of this offense before I spend any big money on any part of it, if I'm the Ravens FO. You may be right--Cam may be the whole problem. The Ravens should have gotten rid of him just to see what would happen, IMO. But until you've got a better idea as to exactly where the problem is... I wouldn't throw a lot of cash around.

Last edited by redmike34; 04-09-2012 at 08:23 PM.
Reason: format of stats was effed